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Making sense of emerging 'wireless Web' technology, how it affects you

By Riley Gay

For many Warner area residents, the Internet has become an indispensable resource for information and communication. We see first-hand the depth of Internet use in our community by the volume of contributions we receive for the Wrangler via email.

Checking and sending email, tracking investments and locating entertainment and recreation information online are all part of the normal daily home or office routine.

Until recently, though, this information was not easily accessible from any place other than your desktop, or laptop, computer.

Now, thanks to the “wireless Web”, all of this data and more can be as close as your cellular phone, pager or PDA (personal digital assistant) device.

And since it appears increasingly inevitable that Wrangler readers either are now or soon will be patched in to this dimension of today’s technology, a small bit of background may be helpful.

Wireless: What it means

Sprint PCS was first to use the term “Wireless Web” to promote its mobile information service; it’s now commonly used to describe most wireless data services.

Comparing the wireless Web to the World Wide Web, the Internet’s graphical component, though, would be misleading at best.

Though similar in many ways to its wired counterpart, the wireless version of the Internet is shaped largely by the piece of equipment you’re using to access its content.

For that reason, the differences are probably more significant than the similarities when discussing the wireless Web.

Because of the limitations in display size and transmission speed inherent in the majority of wireless devices, the content that’s available for mobile access, including its format and method of delivery, is unlike anything found on the wired Web.

The displays on many currently available Web-enabled cellular phones, for example, are limited to just three lines of text.

Transmission speed is generally limited to 9.6 Kbps, so trying to access content from a typical Web page would give new meaning to the pejorative term “world wide wait”.

Processor speed and storage space are also a consideration. Accordingly, browser function is necessarily reduced on wireless Web devices.

Most devices use a “microbrowser” to display data. And while some Web sites do make content available for the wireless Web, it must first be converted and compressed before it’s ready to be displayed.

How wireless devices connect and communicate is also very different from their wired cousins.

The computer in your home or office uses HTTP (Hypertext Transfer Protocol) to communicate with the Internet, while wireless devices use something called WAP (Wireless Application Protocol) to serve a similar purpose.

Where the language of the wired Web is HTML (Hypertext Markup Language) or XML (Extensible Markup Language), WAP (pronounced WHAP)-enabled devices converse using WML (Wireless Markup Language) and a compressed form of HTML called cHTML.

This may sound like so much alphabet soup, and for the most part it’s probably more than you need to know. However, as you begin to hear more about wireless services, you’ll also hear the term “WAP-enabled”, and it’s good to know, in simplified terms, what it all means.

Separate account

And just as you need an account with an Internet service provider to access the wired Internet, you must have a separate account, in addition to your cellular phone or pager service, to get on to the wireless Web.

As an example, the Sprint PCS Wireless Web service costs about $10 a month on top of Sprint’s basic cellular-calling plan.

But if you need to have mobile access to email, news or financial information, or to connect to your company intranet, it’s probably worth the extra cost.

As of now, though, what the wireless Web promises and what it actually delivers are really two different things.

Wireless providers tout their services’ ability to access information from anywhere, anytime, and the wireless Web will allow you to do that.

Besides news, financial and entertainment sites, several established Internet sites are beginning to offer wireless-accessible versions.

These include CNN.com, Weather.com, Bloomberg.com, e-tailer Amazon.com and CharlesSchwab.com, to name a few.

You can store your address book, to-do list and calendar through Yahoo.com and other WAP web sites, as well as have access to your e-mail account.

But, like the wired Internet in its formative years, the wireless Web is a work in progress, and is really just beginning to develop.

Despite the hype surrounding the wireless Web, the reality is that as yet the number, and variety, of sites remains pretty limited.

New cellular phone technology on the horizon should help the wireless Web to realize its potential. The proposed G3 (third generation) wireless standard will bring faster data transmission (up to 1 mbps), larger displays with integrated personal organizers, and built-in GPS receivers that will allow you to pinpoint your location to receive location-targeted services such as restaurant information and travel directions.

You’ll have access to a host of value-added services, such as comparison-shopping and product availability while roaming through the shops at the local mall, for instance.

As WAP-enabled devices improve and gain in popularity, and their usefulness is extended to include “m-commerce” (mobile commerce) and GPS capabilities, they are likely to rival the wired Internet in popularity.

In fact, according to International Data Corp., wireless subscribers with Internet access are projected to outnumber the wired by the end of 2002.

For those who need, or want, mobile connectivity it’s available now, and there are enough services and information to make it worthwhile. But, this is just the beginning and the best is yet to come.

Stay tuned.

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